Current employer and law enforcement methods of drug testing in the field do not offer inexpensive, repeatable and instantaneous results. The paucity of available drug testing solutions require the collection of a urine, blood or other biological sample and subsequent off-site laboratory testing. These tests are expensive and require transporting the sample to a laboratory for analysis by a professional technician. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) National Center for Statistics and Analysis, in 2009, roughly 33% of the 12,055 fatal traffic accidents in the study were found to be caused by a “drugged driver,” and further, some states were significantly higher, such as Montana, which found that 77% were caused by drugged drivers (Department of Transportation 2010). There are no national standards for roadside drug testing and the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) cannot accurately track hit-and-run drugged driving accidents. Law enforcement lacks the tools to effectively mitigate the problem prior to the occurrence of an accident resulting in property damage and/or personal injury, and there is no prevailing roadside drug testing solution that is as reliable as laboratory drug examinations. Unlike, a drunk driver, who may be pulled over and subjected to a breathalyzer examination, a drugged driver, has little fear of being drug tested unless he/she is involved in a traffic accident. Traditional drug testing solutions that require the taking of a biological or breath sample may not meet the Constitutional test under the IV Amendment, protecting the right of the people to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures, especially when probable cause must be established to utilize a drug test prior to the occurrence of a traffic accident or a moving violation (http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-CONAN-1992/pdf/GPO-CONAN-1992-7.pdf). Therefore, a solution that does not require the collection of a biological sample may more readily meet this Constitutional test and hold up as evidence in the prosecution of DUI drugged driving cases in U.S. court systems. One of the drawbacks of field spectroscopic analysis applications is the unpredictability of environmental and ambient lighting conditions. According to a report commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy in 2002, U.S. Lighting Market Characterization, there were roughly 60 million street light fixtures in operation in the United States (2002). According to the same report, the federal government does not keep a national inventory of the market distribution of these luminaires nor the lighting technology implemented. Environmental and ambient lighting conditions, such as fluorescent lighting and sun light, can interfere with Raman and other forms of spectroscopic analysis, and the presence, dispersal and intensity of these lighting conditions are unpredictable in highway, residential and commercial building environments. Such conditions must be accounted for in a field application of Raman spectroscopic analysis solutions. A standardized and repeatable roadside and employment drug testing solution, which meets the needs of field testing applications, could help to save thousands of lives each year by preventing and effectively deterring drugged driving and substance abuse.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,248,588 B2, which is incorporated by reference herein, teaches an apparatus that includes: (a) an enclosure including an aperture; (b) a prism mounted in the enclosure so that a surface of the prism is exposed through the aperture; (c) an optical assembly contained within the enclosure, the optical assembly including a radiation source and a radiation detector, the source being configured to direct radiation towards the prism and the detector being configured to detect radiation from the source reflected from the exposed surface of the prism; and (d) an electronic processor contained within the enclosure, the electronic processor being in communication with the detector. The apparatus can be configured so that, during operation, the electronic processor determines information about a sample placed in contact with the exposed surface of the prism based on radiation reflected from the exposed prism surface while it is in contact with the sample.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,300,220 B2, which is incorporated by reference herein, teaches a probe using integrated confocal reflectance imaging, confocal Raman spectroscopy, and gross spatial imaging for non-invasively evaluating a target of interest of a living subject. In particular, devices and methods are described that integrate confocal imaging with confocal Raman spectroscopy, for non-invasive evaluation of the biochemical compositions and morphological details of normal and cancerous skin lesions of a living subject.
U.S. Patent Application Pub. No. 2013/0006068 A1, which is incorporated by reference herein, teaches a self-contained drug screening apparatus, comprising a breath inlet component for receiving an exhaled air flow of a person, the exhaled air flow including saliva, and a sensor for sensing a presence of an analyte of interest or drug in the saliva, and identification module for detecting an identifying characteristic of the person.
A lightweight, rugged and portable device is needed that could be employed for accurate, standardized and repeatable roadside and employment field drug testing of a wide spectrum of drugs without taking an invasive sample of breath or saliva and non-invasively examining the interiors of the test subjects mouth and nasal passages without the use of a probe.